


in the end i'm going to swallow your heart, darling

by rhllors



Category: His Dark Materials - Philip Pullman
Genre: Alternate Universe - Gender Changes, F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-05-18
Updated: 2012-05-18
Packaged: 2017-11-05 14:11:53
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,248
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/407319
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rhllors/pseuds/rhllors
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>If Marcus Coulter is ice, Lady Asriel is wildfire.</p>
            </blockquote>





	in the end i'm going to swallow your heart, darling

**Author's Note:**

> For Lo.

❝ His hands, still clasping her head, tensed suddenly and drew her toward him in a passionate kiss. Lyra thought it seemed more like cruelty than love [...] 

'You and I could take the universe to pieces and put it together again, Marisa!'

− The Northern Lights

 

 

 

Asriel meets Marcus Coulter on a cold winter's morning. The frost lies crisp on the grass as she and Stefan walk around the garden's of Oxford University. She has recently returned from the North, her hair sits long and matted and her hand is quick to the fire arm concealed in her coat. She could tell tails of armoured bears and glaciers the size of countries, but all they want to hear about is when she is going to settle down or dust.

Asriel would rather talk about husbands than the God forsaken dust.

She is realised from her own imagination when she slams into another warm body. The man is tall and has eyes colder than her father, and the undisguised disdain that burns in them upon meeting her own is not unfamiliar either.

"Watch where you're going, woman." he says sharply, his monkey facing down Stefan; who, in turn, stares back. Stefan is not used to being threatened nor is he used to hearing his Asriel be insulted by a mere man.

"Watch where you're going, man." she replies straight back, watching as the man with eyes colder than her old friend ice collects his dropped books. Raising no hand to help, Asriel sees the books are Bibles.

He's with the Magesterium. Ah.

"How does go The Authority, these days?" Asriel asks, and enjoys how the man's face moves from surprise to irritation, before all emotions are purged completely.

The man sends her a strained smile, full of society's courtesy and barely restrained anger.

"As always, Lady Asriel. Pawns move as the King and Queen watch." he replies, re-balancing his pile of books. She notices how one has escaped his notice, a small book; unlike the rest, it is newly bound and smells of the paper mills. She bends down and offers it to the man, who smoothly accepts it.

"Are you a pawn the, sir? Or are you the King?" she enquires. Lady Asriel, they will say later, Lady Asriel who was bought to her knees by a curiosity that could never be sated.

"Me? I'm not in the game, my Lady. I am the timekeeper." he says, and smile ghosts over his face, before it is gone. Asriel is not sure whether she imagined it or not.

"What can I call you then, Timekeeper?" 

"Marcus Coulter," he says, and then he is gone, disappeared on the hell of his foot, his gracious daemon following in his wake.

Lady Asriel loves many things in this world, but most of all? Most of all she loves the challenge.

 

 

"Marcus, this is Lady Asriel. Lady Asriel, this is Marcus Coulter." the Dean of the college, of course, doesn't know that Marcus' leavings are still sliding down Asriel's legs, under he elegant ball gown.

Mind you, the Dean doesn't know alot of things.

 

 

Asriel likes to delude herself.

She likes to imagine that she is defrosting that ice that lives in Marcus' eyes, that has frozen his beating heart and sunk its teeth into his soul. She likes to imagine that their moments of togetherness are part of his thaw.

Asriel is many, many things, but even she cannot delude herself. Marcus is untouchable, always has been and always will be.

When his wife dies in a tragic accident, Marcus' eyes stay as cold as when they have just fucked against a wall in her house. She bites and tears and pulls, but he is always cold.

Wrapped up in a sheet, Asriel maps his skin with her worn hands. Where she is scarred and mottled, his skin is the colour of clotted cream, marred only by the marks of her blunted nails. Her fingers dance along the ridge of the disks of his back, and he doesn't even draw a shudder.

On the floor, Stefan noses Ozymandias' fur, but the monkey remains just as detached as his other half.

"Are you made of ice, Mr Coutler?" she asks. Curiosity burns in her veins harder and faster than any alcohol or drug.

"I'm a man, Asriel. Flesh and blood, nothing more." he replies, his face impassive as ever. She wants to peel off his skin and see whether there's nothing but clockwork underneath; she feels he is a more machine than man, frozen to the core. Asriel wants to scream and cry and hurt him, just to see if he would react.

She knows in her heart that he will never be thawed.

He rolls on top of her, hands pulling away the sheets that barely covered her away. He looks at her body, the hard lines and dark marks, and his head slides lower and lower and lower, until it rests between her legs.

He breathes up deeply and the cold air on her cunt makes her squirm, her hands pushing his head in closer.

"You're on fire, my Lady." he murmurs, and devours.

 

 

If Marcus Coulter is ice, Lady Asriel is wildfire.

 

 

Asriel wonders whether when she tells him she is pregnant if he will react at. She wants to be the one to defrost him, to smash the cold out of him. 

She should have fucking known he'd stay impassive, no reaction but a quiet raise of the eyebrows, eyes drifting to settle on her slightly swollen stomach. He knows she's not going to ask to what they should do.

Neither have ever deluded them self that there has ever been a "they", and Asriel is Asriel. She doesn't care about what other people think of her, and she won't care about what Marcus wants to do with the child they have made. She is in a half-a-mind to get rid of it, but this--this is her final victory against him. She has taken something from him he can never take back.

They have never been a couple. They have always been a competition, an uphill run, a battle.

"It's yours." she says, quietly. Asriel has only had one lover for quite a long time now.

His eyes remain cold, his face blank and shoulders relaxed.

Always dramatic, something snaps within her. She throws once of his beloved books at him, but he ducks out of the way before it connect with his head. She slaps hard around the face, and although the redness on his skin burns, he remains calm. He looks like a work of fucking art and Asriel wants to claw off his face with her fingers, pull at the sinews, gouge out his eyes.

She has never met a man before who has equally infuriated and set her alight in such a fashion.

"Fuck you." she spits, standing nose to nose with her.

"I think you'll find you already have, Asriel." he comments, his lip twitching.

She storms out of her house and out of his life for twelve years, slamming every door she can behind her.

 

 

"His name is Mr Coutler, Asriel. You'll love him." Lyra enthuses, as they walk through the garden's of Oxford University. Her Pan running in front of them, changing forms faster than the eye can see, asking Stefan to join. Stefan never joins, but Pan always asks.

"Really? You'll have to introduce me." she replies, and Lady Asriel is relit.

**Author's Note:**

> based on some fancastings i did on tumblr ages ago found [here](http://cremuel.tumblr.com/post/21876001449/you-dont-understand-do-you-they-wanted-me-to) and [here](http://cremuel.tumblr.com/post/21873476328/they-tried-to-find-good-in-me-they-searched-my).


End file.
